2020/21 Arsenal Season Diary pt.1 (Matches 1-11)

This year I decided to do something that most football fans have done for decades, I kept a match diary.

What inspired me is my own failing memory. Ten years ago I could remember details and data from watching a match a single time. I still know weird data points, for example, about Arsenal’s 2015/16 season. But these days, my brain is like a junk drawer so full of useless stuff that I don’t seem to have room to store new things. And with social media speeding up the instant gratification over the long-term storage I often can’t even remember important moments from a match I watched a few hours earlier.

To combat this, I bought a notebook and for every single Arsenal match, I took handwritten notes on what I saw or thought about what was happening on the pitch. The trick here was to NOT tweet these thoughts, but rather to turn off Twitter and write things down instead. Interestingly, I can see quite a few matches where I only managed to stay off twitter for half a match and by the 2nd half, I was back to shitposting rather than following through with my diary.

But I’m not going to be hard on myself for slipping, there are a lot of great observations and almost none of you were able to do what I did even for a few games! I’m proud of myself for following through with this practice as much as I did. Practice itself is difficult. Just playing bass for 15 minutes a day, meditating, or doing something mundane like eating 4 pieces of fruit a day is challenging. I know that a lot of people hate when others congratulate themselves (and let’s be honest, this isn’t like I solved global warming or anything) because it shows a lack of humility so to appease those folks while in no way actually apologizing for my hubris I will say (and mean) anyone can do this, it’s not that special. In fact, millions of people have done it and you could do it too. Next year!

Season quote inscribed on page one before the season started: “The only moment of possible happiness, is the present. The past gives regrets. And future uncertainties.” It’s by Arsene Wenger from his interview with L’Equipe in 2015. The full quote is below* for folks who like that sort of thing.

Fulham v. Arsenal – “Open, Fun”

Note: before the season started I wanted to record something I called “non-shot big chances”. These were events like those dangerous crosses on the edge of the 6 which just missed a player or things like a 1-v-1 with the keeper which didn’t result in a shot for some reason. If the idea of football is to win and to win you have to score goals (most of the time) and to score goals you have to create good chances then the number of good chances a team creates (regardless of whether they ended of creating a shot or not) should be important. I didn’t follow through with this (numerically) and forgot about recording it in my notes after a few matches. I still like this idea as a measure of how close a team is to creating and how well they are defending and I have added it to my “list of things to record” for next season’s diary. My point here is that you will see this data pop up in the first few games and I wanted to explain why.

• Gabriel early error, Leno saves
• Arsenal non-shot big chance
• Lacazette tap-in off Willian’s saved shot
• Maitland-Niles is playing a weird role: come inside to CM in possession and wide to FB out of possession
• No attacking mid for Arsenal
• No one between the lines for Arsenal
• Arsenal kicking long but no one to win the ball
• Willian nearly scores off a DFK, thankfully Luiz isn’t taking them
• Xhaka playing without any pressure
• HOLDINHO DRIBBLE! (Remember that?)
• Willian assist off a corner
• Gabriel scores on his debut (he’s one of only 8 guys to score for Arsenal on their Premier League debut – Gabriel, Soares, Auba, Laca, Verm, Nasri, Adebayor, and Ljungberg)
• “Bellerin could have been sent off” (I don’t remember what for)

Arsenal v. West Ham “Packed in”

• Lots of sloppy passing for Arsenal
• Tierney injured, Kolasinac in
• Gabriel makes two big saving blocks
• Holding struggling to hang on, like his hair
• Arteta clearly screaming at the players “DANNY DANNY ATTACK ATTACK COME ON”
• Willian is playing in the #10
• West Ham crowding the midfield
• Gabriel’s “pace” is awesome, as is his passing
• Arsenal score from high play
• Wham score “just a good goal” – Kola slow to close, Xhaka couldn’t stop it, Gabriel couldn’t cut it out, and Bobby couldn’t get in front. (Post match thought: lol, I was in a generous mood!)
• Pepe forced to run 200 yards every time we do win possession back because we are so deep
• Arteta yelling at Nketiah when he didn’t take the ball to the corner flag “EDDIE, WHY EDDIE?”

Leicester 0-2 Arsenal “Scrappy” (League Cup)

• Nketiah scores a scrappy goal
• Foul on Saka clear as day pen, denied
• Pepe isolated, could hear Brentan Rodgers yelling “show him outside”

Liverpool-Arsenal “Impossible”

• Mane gets a yellow card for elbowing Tierney in the face
• Xhaka is man-marking Fabinho
• David Luiz clears off the line
• Foul throw by Bellerin, lol – I spent the rest of the year pointing out whenever someone committed a foul throw, it happens all the time
• Maitland-Niles nightmare 1st half – tons of bad passes, he can’t handle pressure at all
• Mane scores, beating the pants off Tierney
• 2nd goal for Pool, Willian fails to track back and Roberts gets behind Bellerin
• Bellerin called for another foul throw, incredible
• Lacazette poor chance, Pepe poor chance – both strikers way out of form

Liverpool – Arsenal (League Cup)

• Nketiah blows a HUGE non-shot chance (I can’t remember this one)
• Nketiah pressing hard
• I really like Pepe/Saka
• We can’t create shots: many chances going begging, we don’t even get a corner until the 69th minute, Pepe gets a shot off late in the game and I wrote “WOO HOO!”
• Milner handball no call, Ceb gets a yellow for arguing
• Arsenal win the penalty shootout because Leno saved Wilson’s shot

Arsenal-Sheffield United

• Tierney starts as a center back sort of thing (the one where he gets forward-ish)
• 27′ Arsenal get their first shot off
• No card for wild lunge on Auba
• Non-shot big chance Ceballos to Auba
• I’m surprised about how often I mention Ceballos and his attacking play
• WILLIAN THE VILLIAN – playing ACM, gets the ball forward and we score, he’s also playing between the two banks of defenders, he’s our only one doing this
• I mention this “between the lines” a lot in these early notes, i was sort of obsessed that we weren’t playing anyone between the lines and how much we seemed to let other teams just camp there (especially Liverpool)
• Pepe bombs forward and scores!
• Tierney beaten by McGoldrick and the score is 2-1

Man City 1-0 Arsenal “boring, bland”

• Willian in the hole again – I forgot that we tried to play him as CAM/AMF/10 so often
• We aren’t playing in midfield hardly at all (maybe this is what Pep meant when he complimented Arteta’s tactics after the match?
• Struggling to stop them getting forward, too much talent, too many great touches
• City just picking spaces
• Pepe forced to just sprint 100 yards whenever we get the ball, this is so bad
• Man City have FOUR PLAYERS BETWEEN THE LINES
• 2nd half, both teams seemed to apply the handbrake
• Arsenal not taking advantage
• From here on out, I document just foul after foul. Weird.
• David Luiz nearly scores an own goal
• Partey comes on and shows his dribbling ability

Rapid – Arsenal

• Fans in the stands!
• Rapid pressing us high
• They have a guy named Taxi, lol
• Nketiah gets a yellow for shooting after the whistle
• Arsenal playing with the handbrake, frustrating
• Lacazette turning the ball over
• 2nd half Leno turnover for an easy Taxi goal
• Nketiah could have been sent off
• Oh hey! 57th minute and we have decided not to play with the handbrake anymore!
• Lots of attacking and pressing, Saka looks sharp, Thomas is dribbling out of pressure
• It all happens at the end of the game: Pepe created for David Luiz on a free kick for a goal, Elneny makes a splitting pass, Bellerin makes a run and cross, Auba tap-in
• Leno nearly gives up a 2nd goal

Arse-Less (must be Leicester, lol)

• Huh, I stopped taking notes after about 30 minutes

Arse 3-0 Dundalk “A bit of fun”

• Maitland-Nile and Cedric are the main buildup players
• Willock looking good playing very high up the pitch
• WE GET PLAYERS BETWEEN THE LINES! (Nelson and Willock)
• Willock again, in the half-spaces, between the lines
• Nelson causing chaos with his dribbling
• Nketiah scrappy goal off a blown claim by their keeper
• Willock goal – Pepe’s shot was blocked, great touch, great control by Willock, wicked shot
• Pepe goal – with his right foot?
• Willock tried to walk it in again!
• Nketiah misses badly, Arteta takes him off
• Balogun is quick and seems to know where he wants the ball!

Man U 0-1 Arsenal

• Holy cow this is long! I think I’ll break this into 10 match chunks
• Willian is slow (is he injured?)
• Elneny is passing forward, is he injured?
• Arsenal dominating, winning the ball back, attacking
• Huge non-shot chance – Bellerin’s cross to the far post
• Thomas is bossing Paul early
• Tierney with another non-shot chance, lots of good passing
• Referee gives out 3 yellows very quickly: Fred, Holding, then Gabriel – A W-B should have gotten one too for a professional foul on Saka
• United are terrifying on counters!
• Elneny is driving us forward, who is this Elneny???
• Another non-shot big chance
• Willian hits the crossbar, unlucky
• Bellerin is having a great game, cross to Saka for a header
• 2nd half
• McTominay hurts Auba
• Man U changed something (can’t tell what) but they are playing better
• Arsenal turning the ball over every time, gah
• We look bad, slow, half-speed
• Pogba seal dribble, fouled by Bellerin
• Magwire misses a big chance
• Pogba fouls Bellerin and MIKE DEAN AWARDS ARSENAL A PENALTY!
• Mike Dean also passes up the chance to give Gabriel a red
• Crazy three minutes! United want a pen, we nearly score an own goal, and Leno face-saved a shot. And to top it all off… Mustafi comes on!

*”I still live in the future. It is planned. Tight. My relationship with time is quite scary. I’m still trying to fight it. I’m always afraid of being late. Not to be ready. Not being able to accomplish all that I planned. My personal relationship with time is scary. To go back in time, to look behind yourself is equally staggering.

The only moment of possible happiness, is the present. The past gives regrets. And future uncertainties. Man quickly realised this and created the religion. It forgives him what he has done wrong in the past and tells him not to worry about the future, as you will go to paradise.” – Arsene Wenger, 2015

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